The 18-135mm IS kit lens and a 70-300mm f/4-5.6 IS USM. I'm wondering if I should have ordered online and went with a Tamron 18-270mm PZD lens for my Alaskan cruise this August. I need a good walk around lens. I have a lot of learning to do.
Some of the best learning you can do, is go out and experiment with different settings and record what settings you had the camera on when you took each shot. Good luck! I love photography.
Thanks, I'll give those a look. Guess I was confused with the term "walkaround." I'm a little concerned about when we're on our whale watch. Who knows if the whales will breach far away or up close. Thats why I was thinking about that 18-270 Tamron.
Only problem with large variable focal length lenses is they generally lack sharpness (usually softest at wide open), and they're often slow on the long end. Sometimes these drawbacks don't outweight the benefit of having the convenience of one lens when traveling, though.
What would you recommend while we are salmon fishing? I'd like to capture some landscapes, wildlife (near and far), and of course some trophy shots if we are lucky enough to catch some fish. Right now I only have the two lenses....18-135 and 70-300. What about teleconverters? I'd like as much reach as possible.
The 70-300 is a great starter telephoto lens, so take that for your longer shots. It's not wide enough for landscapes, but trophy shots and pics of your buds should be fine. The 18-135 will fill in the gaps, but I would spring for either the Canon 15-85mm (GREAT image stabilization), or the Sigma 17-50mm F2.8. Either of these with your 70-300 will be more than sufficient to cover your trip. Teleconverters are nice in certain situations as long as you understand their limitations. Your lens will almost never be as sharp with one on as opposed to without, but often (as long as it's no more than 1.4x), it's negligible. You also have to remember you lose stops of exposure. A 1.4x teleconverter causes you to loose 1 stop, and a 2x will cause you to lose 2 stops. This means your F4-F5.6 70-300 now is a F5.6-F8. It will no longer auto focus (EOS bodies/lenses won't AF beyond F5.6). So, it's a trade off really.
